Sexual selection: isn’t it romantic?
Callou, callay, it’s Smart Bitches Day!
Casting about for motivation for your main character? Is she looking for wit, wealth, or wicked good looks in her man?
Nope. What she really wants is a top-notch gene donor. Brains and beauty are indicators of high quality DNA, and wealth should improve the chances that their many babies will survive and breed unto the next generation.
So goes the theory of daddy-daughter team David and Nanelle Barash, who last year released their sociobiological interpretation of literature, Madame Bovary’s Ovaries. Sexual selection, a key element of Darwinism and a centerpiece of the Barashes’ thesis, refers to traits which may not necessarily be adaptive but help to attract mates. Think about a peacock’s iridescent tail feathers, which attract peahens and predators alike. Think about Porsches and Beamers and big fat gold chains hanging on the necks of certain rappers.
Not that any of you would be that shallow.
In some instances, the Barash method yields fresh ways of looking at things. From Denis Dutton’s Washington Post review:
. . . discriminating human females are central to the world of Jane Austen, whom the Barashes call “the poet laureate of female choice.†Selecting a good mate is Austen’s major theme. She is particularly adept at bringing out, against the vast intricacies of a social milieu, the basic values women seek in men, and men tend to want in women (shortlist: good looks, health, money, status, IQ, courage, dependability and a pleasant personality — in many different weightings and orderings). Not being a peacock, Mr. Darcy does not have iridescent feathers, but for human females his commanding personality, solid income, intelligence, generosity, and the magnificent Pemberley estate do very nicely.
Madame Bovary’s Ovaries has its flaws, which Dutton’s review illuminates nicely. I encourage you to read the whole thing. But it occurred to me that, flawed or not, the premise of Darwinian motivation for literary characters has, at the very least, comic merit.
A few ideas:
- One male suitor attempts to topple another by sending his lady love a faked lab report demonstrating that the rival male has a precariously low sperm count.
- To get noticed by an aloof beauty, a wealthy (think Bill Gates) geek sets up a contest for Best DNA of the Year. He bribes the judges, naturally. A witty but bald and short and slightly overweight molecular biologist becomes suspicious and uses statistical arguments to prove the fraud. The beauty and the molecular biologist go off into the sunset.
- You know how Law and Order keeps reusing the sperm donor plot? Arrogant fertility doc only uses his own sperm to create viable embryos for implantation, starts killing people who find out, yatta yatta. How about the distaff version? Arrogant female fertility doc uses her own eggs to create viable embryos, etc. Yeah, she harvests eggs from women, but destroys them. The Bush Administration finds out, makes it a federal case, and Bill Frist & Gonzo Gonzales team up to prosecute.
What’s that? No romance in that last one? Well, how about this. Our perp has been at it for the last 25 years. Unbeknownst to her, her handsome young defense lawyer is actually her son! And she falls for him! We’ll call it Oedipus 2020.
Yeah, you’re right. I don’t understand the romance genre at all.
D.
Clafouti notes
Success!
Well, near disaster, as the damnable thing almost slid off the rimless cookie sheet when I lifted it out of the oven. Nevertheless, Karen gave it a big thumb’s up, I liked it too, and Jake declared it flavorless. As Meatloaf used to sing, two out of three ain’t bad.
Here are a few adjustments to the recipe:
1. Since I had to throw out my flour yesterday (too worried about the possibility of glass splinters landing in there), I used Jiffy Pizza Mix, which is essentially just flour and baking powder. This worked fine.
2. I used fewer blueberries, perhaps 1.5 boxes worth. I didn’t pack them in as densely as I did yesterday — that seemed like blueberry overkill.
3. Most important thing to note: I had to bake it for 90 minutes, not 60. That seems typical for my oven, however; I usually have to bake things longer than the recipe claims.
4. I added a little cinnamon and nutmeg to the powdered sugar. Probably unnecessary.
5. Only 10 calories per slice!
Just kidding about that last bit (unless you serve five degree slices).
D.
A shaggy meme
Candy put me up to this. Which ten celebrities would I most like to shag?
Killer Clafouti
It’s only a killer if you follow these instructions, and you are struck in the carotid artery with a large shard of glass. Otherwise, it’s merely tasty.
One more caveat: I haven’t made this yet with blueberries. Tomorrow maybe. Julia’s recipe uses 3 cups of pitted black cherries; blueberries should work, but they are a wetter fruit than cherries, so the result may be a bit odd. I’ll let you know.
Blueberry Clafouti (inspired by Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1)
Preheat oven to 350F.
Cleaned and ready to use: two small boxes of blueberries — about 2 cups (enough to cover the layer of your pie pan one-blueberry-deep)
Place the following ingredients into the blender jar in the order listed. Cover and blend at top speed for one minute:
1 1/4 cups milk
1/3 cup granulated sugar
3 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup flour
Melt about 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter in the bottom of a nonstick metal pie pan or pyrex pie dish (7 to 8 cup volume). Coat bottom of dish with the butter. Pour enough batter into the pan to make a 1/4 inch layer. Put it into the oven and wait until you have a rather firm layer adherent to the bottom of the pan.
Add blueberries and spread them out, single layer thick. Sprinkle 1/3 cup granulated sugar on top of the blueberries, and add the rest of the batter. (You might want to whir up the batter for a few seconds before adding it.)
Bake for one hour. It should puff up and be brown on top (between the berries). Sprinkle top with powdered sugar and serve hot or warm.
***
Coming soon:
I succumb to Candy’s meme, “Ten celebrities I would shag.”
Later!
D.
Dumbass move of the day
Karen wanted a blueberry clafouti for breakfast today, so, loving husband that I am, I obliged.
In case you’re saying, “Huh? Wha?” a clafouti is a fruit pancake you bake in the oven. Or a giant muffin, something like that. You mix the batter in a blender, and then you pour some of the batter into a deep pie dish and let it set up a bit in the oven. Next, you add fruit, sugar, and the rest of the batter. Bake for one hour. Dust with powdered sugar.
I became inpatient with the “let it set up a bit in the oven” step. After waiting three or four minutes, the batter still had not firmed up, so I placed the dish (a heavy glass pie dish, oven safe, but not Pyrex) over a low heat. I moved it frequently so that it would heat in an even fashion.
Floppy defeats Blogger! Woo-hoo!
I’m not sure how I did it, but I managed to import my blogger archives into this new & improved WordPress Balls and Walnuts. For what it’s worth, here’s what I did:
I replaced my Blogger template with Andy Skelton’s template script (the stuff in the gray blockquote box).
Next, I went to my wp-admin dashboard, clicked on Import, and then clicked on Reset this Importer. I guess that got rid of my previous screw-ups, because this time, I was able to click on my blog-of-choice (Balls and Walnuts, of course), and it worked!
Since I’m still feeling siiiiick, I spent the last hour or so categorizing my May ’05 posts. As of this instant, all of the April and May ’05 posts are categorized. I’m going to try chipping away at this, a little each day.
Only one problem importing from Blogger: the photos I had uploaded using Blogger’s photo import tool did not transfer over. Out of laziness, I deleted those posts. Fortunately, I didn’t use that tool very often.
‘Kay, that’s it for tonight. See ya tomorrow.
D.
PS: This should go without saying, but some folks are as dense as I am, so . . .
Make sure you make a copy of your Blogger template before substituting the Skelton template. That way, you’ll be able to restore your Blogger blog to its original glory after you’re done importing to WordPress — assuming you want to do that.
Best. Biscuits. Ever.
From Cook’s Illustrated, the best cooking magazine ever (July/August 2004):
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon double-acting baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
4 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch cubes
1.5 cups cold low-fat buttermilk
nonstick cooking spray
To form and finish the biscuits:
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
- Adjust rack to middle position and preheat oven to 500F. Spray 9-inch round cake pan with cooking spray, dust with flour, set aside.
- In food processor, pulse the dry ingredients and the butter until pebbly. Transfer to mixing bowl and refrigerate until the oven is preheated.
- Add buttermilk. Stir until the wet and dry ingredients are just combined.
- Using a 1/4 cup measuring cup, scoop out some dough and drop it into the all-purpose flour. Gently coat with flour and roll the biscuit from hand to hand to get rid of the excess flour. Drop it onto the cake pan. Repeat. You want the biscuits to touch one another. (Cook’s Illustrated sez: 9 biscuits snugly around the perimeter of the cake pan, three in the center.)
- Spoon melted butter over tops of biscuits. Bake 5 minutes at 500 degrees, then lower oven to 450. Bake an additional 15 minutes or until the tops are golden.
- Cook’s Illustrated sez to cool in pan 2 minutes, invert onto a dish, and cool 5 minutes longer. We eat ’em straight out of the oven.
These biscuits will totally effin KILL your low carb diet. They’re great as is, but they’re extra decadent with honey and more butter.
Tonight, I made these biscuits, ham, and candied yams. Not bad, considering I ate some bad chicken yesterday, and I’ve felt bloated and nauseated ever since. Oy.
D.
The better-late-than-never thirteen
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Thirteen Memories of Food
2. In Kindergarten, we had to drink milk at recess. Had to. You couldn't throw away your milk unless the level had dropped down below the level of the cow's bell. 3. First grade: I remember the taste of guinea pig pellets (not bad) and nontoxic paste (bad). I would taste anything. I'm still that way. 4. In case you haven't guessed, I used to have pica. From that link, I learned, "Pica is most common in people with developmental disabilities, including autism and mental retardation, and in children between the ages of 2 and 3. Although kids younger than 18 to 24 months can try to eat nonfood items, it isn't necessarily considered abnormal at that age." Good to know. My favorite nonfood items: the shellac on the wood of my bedframe; chalk from any source, even the ground; tar dripping off telephone poles. 5. On the other hand, I hated bananas, carrots, cantaloupes, raw nuts, and avocado. They made my throat itch. (Remember that, Sis?) Nowadays, naturally, I love 'em all. 6. I've never tasted breast milk. (That's a non-memory.) 8. When my mother made brown rice, I would slather it with margarine and soak it with soy sauce. "You must be half-Chinese," she'd say. 9. But I was all kwailo as far as my girlfriend's mom was concerned. For the most part, I loved her cooking, as long as she didn't try to feed me fish stomach. I found out later (long after we broke up) that the woman really, really liked me. She even liked my mother. No surprise there. 10. Worst thing eaten at a Chinese wedding: squab, poorly prepared. 11. Best thing eaten at a Chinese wedding: abalone, well prepared. 12. First year away from home, my boarding house mom fixed dinners for me and my roommate. Marguerite Slater, a wonderful woman, had a catering business on the side. She had even met Julia Child. I think often of Mrs. Slater, and grumble over the fact she would never part with her apple pie recipe. The. Best. Ever. 13. In the Berkeley Co-ops, the students took turns preparing meals. Worst idea ever: tuna jello. I missed out on that one, thankfully.
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Britney Spears’s Li’l Road Warrior
Sean Preston Federline-Spears enjoying a morning out with Mom. Like mother, like son?
D.